A mobile terminal platform can provide applications developed based on the mobile terminal operating systems, to implement various user-oriented functions. For example, Apple's IOS platform provides mobile terminal applications based on the IOS system, Google's ANDROID platform provides mobile terminal applications based on the Android system, and Windows' mobile terminal platform provides mobile terminal applications based on the Windows system.
The applications on the mobile terminal platform can be started by using other applications. For example, a short message including a URL address is received by a short message application, after the user taps the URL address in the short message, the mobile terminal can open a web page. The opened web page can be opened by using a default browser application of the mobile terminal. For another example, when performing payment transaction, a local application A (for example, a ticket purchase application) on the mobile terminal can open a payment page by using a WebView component integrated in the local application A, so as to start a local application B (for example, a payment application) through the payment page.
Specifically, for example, a certain short message in a short message application of the mobile terminal may include a link to ALIPAY. After the user taps the link in the short message, the mobile terminal can open a page of the link by using a default browser application. Further, the page can attempt to invoke a local application B (for example, ALIPAY) by using a scheme URI, so that the user can perform an operation in ALIPAY. Scheme URI is a system-level resource location method, and supports mobile platform systems such as Android, IOS, and Windows. In the previous example, after invoking ALIPAY, pages opened by browser applications of most mobile platform systems usually do not disappear, but jump to a boot page for downloading an application in a short period of time. As such, even if ALIPAY has already been installed on the mobile terminal, the page that the browser jumps to still prompts the user to download ALIPAY.
For another example, a link to TAOBAO merchandise is opened by operating a local application A of the mobile terminal, for example, the local application A can open a page of the link by using a WebView component. Further, the page can attempt to invoke a local application B (for example, TAOBAO) by using a scheme URI, so that the user can perform an operation in TAOBAO. In the previous example, after invoking TAOBAO, pages opened by WebView components in the local application A of most mobile platform systems usually do not disappear, but jump to a boot page for downloading an application in a short period of time. As such, even if TAOBAO has already been installed on the mobile terminal, the page that is jumped to by using the WebView component still prompts the user to download TAOBAO.
It can be seen that, in the existing technology, after a web page is opened and a corresponding application is invoked, the opened web page cannot learn that the corresponding application has already been installed on the mobile terminal. Therefore, regardless of whether the corresponding application has already been installed on the mobile terminal or not, the mobile terminal is directed to an application downloading page. The communication process is prolonged, resources are wasted, and the user experience is affected.